Open-Source Robotics: Towards an established practice

Selected chapters in previous editions of the World Robotics Report documented why and how Open-Source Software (OSS) is an important factor to leverage in the domains of robotics and automation.558 We can summarize the situation as follows. First, robotics and automation are increasingly software-intensive businesses, as most new functionalities graduating from the research environment and becoming available for application deployment are implemented in software. Relevant examples are perception and planning algorithms that make, for instance, autonomous navigation in non-structured environments feasible. Second, open-source as a way to exchange software and the communities revolving around it as a means to collaborate on it, are relevant factors that businesses aiming to have an impact in software-intensive domains must account for. Companies operating in the server and smartphone industries are very concrete and compelling examples in this sense.